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Wilton Blog - Ideas from Wilton

Just ask Steve for Halloween “SPOOKY” Entertaining/Party Ideas

October 19th, 2010 by Cheryl Brown

Working with Steve Rocco, Senior Director of Cake and Visual Design, on a daily basis can be entertaining enough, but this time we raised the bar in “Spooky” for ideas for Halloween Parties.

As the decorating room supervisor I work directly with Steve every day coordinating with our decorating team to bring all of Steve’s sketches to life. After completing the projects, we photograph them and post/ publish them for all our customers to see and re-create. Daily, this is an exciting and challenging job with something new happening all the time.

After completing all the Spooky Halloween projects for the web, I sat down with Steve to find out more about what inspired these new “Goulish” projects!!!!

1. What Inspired the designs of the Spooky projects that were designed for the website?

We wanted to step outside the box and go for a little more shock factor …..The individual projects were based on gore and Halloween fright. Movies were a big inspiration (hence the vampire / Nosferatu cake, the mummy cake, body parts coming out of the round cake, etc.). There is a story of a dead bride that walks in night in a cemetery that has always intrigued me (hence the dead bride cake). Bugs are hitting an all time high for popularity (hence the bug cakes) ……It is the one time of the year when there are no boundaries, so why not have fun with it in food! The party scenes were based off of our party line themes … Nothing says Halloween more than with a gore theme party!

2. These designs are a little more goulish than we usually do, were these directed for more adult entertaining/ parties?

Yes. Halloween is not just for kids. In fact costumes for adults is a larger popular trend than kids getting all dressed up.

3. Are any of these designs good for the beginner decorator?

Yes. The vomiting cake is not hard to do at all. This one, you can have a lot of fun without worrying about your skill level. Also, with our party line themes we make it simple for the beginner with all the accents we offer to decorate a cupcake /cake, etc….

4. We used many of our everyday bakeware shaped pans to complete these projects, turning them into something completely different. How do you come up with these ideas?

This is what makes designing fun !…I literally take the pans and turn them in all directions until I see a shape that will work for a particular character I am using as a design ….

5. How big a role do the needs of our consumers come into play when designing projects?

They play a huge part in my designs …I am a consumer myself. I put myself in their shoes and think about what I would want to see. What will excite me and what will make me inspired to want to recreate a specific project. I also have to keep in mind that there a wide range of expectations. This is what makes Wilton unique. We make sure all styles / trends are met for the needs of our variety of customers …..

As you can read, Steve loves to design and the Wilton Decorating Room Team loves to bring all of his creations to reality. Halloween is one of our favorite seasons as it lets us all play a little on the “ dark side” with our creativity!!!!!

Hope everyone has a “GOULISHLY SPOOKY” Halloween!!!!!!!!!!

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Cheryl has been the decorating room supervisor at Wilton for 3 years and truly enjoys the fun and exciting projects that are produced daily in the room. Cheryl’s start in the cake decorating/ baking industry came young as her first job was in an in-store bakery helping the bakers and decorators. Since then she has had many roles in this industry from retail to management to sales and has loved every aspect of the business.
Cheryl’s daughter is a decorator in the making and has taken a few courses at the Wilton School as well as decorating and baking at home with Mom. Cheryl also spends a lot of time as her daughter’s chauffeur. Between dance classes and riding and showing her horse, they still find time to visit Cheryl’s family and friends back in Canada.

I purchased the 7-tier wedding cupcake tower and love it. I used it for my son’s wedding. The tiers and center columns were returned but they lost the bolts. Can I purchase replacement bolts. HELP! I can’t use my tower again unless I have these.

Hi Linda,
I think it is our Tall tier Cake Stand you are talking about, isn’t it wonderful for cupcakes also! If you call our customer service department they can help you with new bolts. 1-800-794-5866.